J-LO:BETTER THAN EVER WITH A NEW ALBUM, WORLD TOUR AND TOY BOY IN TOW, JENNIFER LOPEZ IS BACK WITH A VENGEANCE. BY TIFFANY BAKKER ennifer Lopez has quite the entourage. When I meet the singer in New York’s star- infested Tribeca neighbourhood, it’s immediately apparent we won’tJ be having an intimate chat about her upcoming – and first – Australian tour. Instead, there are at least 15 other people in the small room as witness. Who the majority of them are, I have no idea (I’m not sure Lopez does, either), but they stand silently by, except in the moments when they laugh eagerly after the star says something vaguely funny. Celebrity is an often odd existence, but Lopez has long lived an odd life, since getting her break as a dancer on US TV show In Living Colour in the early ’90s. In the ensuing years, through her many hit albums (On the 6, J.Lo, This Is Me... Then), occasional hit movies (1998’s Out Of Sight was good!) and a navel-bearing Versace dress that garnered world attention (“I just thought it was pretty”), she’s become a global superstar. CELEBRITY It’s a long way from “Jenny from the Block”, who grew up in a cramped apartment in the Bronx, the middle of three sisters, and would sing and dance in the family’s lounge room. There have been lean periods, too, but in recent times, she’s prospered again. In May, Forbes magazine named Lopez number one on the Celebrity 100 List, anointing her the most powerful global celebrity of the past year and reporting she’d raked in $52 million in a single year. “I’m most proud that it’s still all new to me,” she says of her enduring career. “That it’s still fresh to me and I haven’t become jaded with all the stuff that goes along with this business and being in the public eye. I still enjoy going to a set and acting, I still enjoy going into the studio, and I get excited by a song or an idea for a film. I’m proud I’ve been able to hold on to that. That little girl inside me is still there. I know how this business can beat that out of you – I’ve seen it – but I’ve been able to keep my feet on the ground and be grateful for the things I have and not take anything for granted.” In person, Lopez is what you’d call, in that old fashioned sense of the word, a true ‘star’. She’s so utterly flawless, it’s as if she’s from another very attractive planet. In a dress that accentuates her figure, and heels so high I’m not sure how she walks in them, she’s truly stunning. It must be very strange, I venture, to walk through the world aware of your own beauty. “You haven’t seen me in the morning,” she replies with a snort. Her entourage giggles along, but still, it’s hard to imagine her looking much different in her pyjamas. At 43, she’s enjoying something of a career revival. Her two seasons as a judge on American Idol (she was the nice, nurturing, constructive one) reintroduced her to the public and reinvigorated her career, which had floundered for much of the past decade. Thanks to the show, her recording career has taken off again, too, and her 2011 single “IT’S STILL ALL ‘On the Floor’ became her most successful FRESH TO ME. in eight years. It was also the most viewed video on YouTube that year. Jenny, it seems, I HAVEN’T BECOME has her groove back. JADED WITH “American Idol made people look at me THE STUFF THAT differently, which surprised me because I always thought people knew how I was,” GOES ALONG WITH she explains. “I’d always get confused when THIS BUSINESS the media would paint me to be different – it was so weird to me. But with reality TV, AND BEING IN THE you really are exposed for who and what you PUBLIC EYE” are. I was lucky people saw the real me, and that changed some people’s opinion of who I was.” > SUNDAY MAGAZINE 13 CELEBRITY (from top) Over the years, Lopez had developed before marrying back-up dancer Cris Judd Onstage a reputation – deserved or not – for being a in 2001. They split in 2002. Then there was in 2007; with boyfriend demanding diva; a perception that annoys the engagement to Ben Affleck later that Casper Smart her. “It’s disappointing, because you’re a good year (with whom she cavorted on a yacht for and her twins, person and you try to live a good life,” she her ‘Jenny from the Block’ video and starred Max and says. “You’re working hard to create things in two disastrous films, Gigli and Jersey Girl). Emme, 4. people enjoy, and you have this counteraction Ultimately, the media saturation that went of gossip and lies and negative energy. It with the relationship led to their break-up. comes with the territory and I’m not trying “It was ridiculous and crazy,” she recalls. to complain about it. Everybody has to go The pair remain “friendly”, with Affleck through it, but it’s not nice when it’s just lies.” saying, “When she landed American Idol, She says nobody would bat an eyelid if I said, ‘This was really smart. Good luck.’ I she were a man. “Men definitely don’t go touch base. I respect her. I like her. She’s put through what I have,” she adds, rolling her up with some stuff that was unfair in her life, eyes. “It’s completely sexist. Even if men are and I’m really pleased to see her successful.” nightmares – and I’ve worked with some Lopez then rekindled her relationship with actors and thought, eeew – nobody hears Latino singer Marc Anthony (they dated in about it, so everybody thinks they’re the 1999). They wed in 2004, had twins Max and nicest guys. It’s like, men are powerful, Emme in 2008, but split last year. She admits whereas I get called a b*tch.” the focus on her failed romances hurts. In the mid ’90s, Lopez suffered something “Imagine going through something personal of a backlash; her private life hit the headlines and somebody finds out and starts talking and the public seemed to tire of her. After a about it, and it hurts you. Now imagine a failed marriage to waiter Ojani Noa in 1997 global level of people saying things about (they divorced in 1998 and ended up in court you,” she explains. “It’s awful, but you just after he tried to sell intimate details of their have to know what’s real. I know what I did relationship), she dated Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, and I know what the true story is.” Not that she’s given up on love. “I’m such there in the morning. I’m going to sleep now BACKSTAGE a romantic, I’ve always been so in love with and I’ll see you in the morning.’” love,” she adds. “Maybe I should’ve been It’s another reason she left American Idol ROMANCES more careful, but I don’t regret what I’ve this year (happy to let Mariah Carey and LOPEZ ISN’T THE FIRST STAR TO DATE ONE OF been through to get here.” Nicki Minaj duke it out at the judge’s table), HER BACK-UP DANCERS. HERE’S A LOOK AT OTHER SINGERS WHO FOUND LOVE ONSTAGE. For the past year, she’s been dating her despite advice it would hurt her career. former back-up dancer Casper Smart, 25, “I loved Idol, but I had to go with my gut that EDIA. BRITNEY SPEARS M who’s now the choreographer on her Dance it was time to get back to doing what I do,” Spears hooked up with dancer Kevin Federline ER PP Again World Tour, which heads to Australia she says. “It’s fun to be a judge and it was in 2004. They married in October of that year and Spears subsequently gave birth to two sons, Sean in December. “We work well together a great thing for me. But, creatively, it wasn’t and Jayden, before filing for divorce in 2006. AGES, SNA AGES, creatively. He inspires me, I inspire him, fulfilling to me as a person.” M and we can do something that someone who And that means going back on tour, kids in MADONNA doesn’t have that kind of love for you can’t.” tow. “They watch the show almost every night Young boys seem to be a weakness for the Queen Her greatest love, though, are her four- – they love it, they’re excited by it.” Max and of Pop. The 54-year-old’s latest squeeze, dancer Brahim Zaibat, is 25, making him 29 years her junior. year-old twins. “The best thing about being Emme, it seems, are starting to show signs They’ve been together for almost two years. ER MEDIA, GETTY I GETTY MEDIA, ER PP a mom is the love you feel and the joy they of their parents’ talent. “We were having NA S bring to you,” she says. “I’m never happier or lunch and I started singing [hit song ‘Waiting PRINCE more complete than when I’m lying in bed for Tonight’], ‘Cause I have spent all of my His royal purpleness first met dancer Mayte Garcia when she was 16, and she later became his onstage with my babies, watching a movie.” life’, and at the same time both of them go, muse then his girlfriend.